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Plus Dane Housing Limited (202325300)

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REPORT

COMPLAINT 202325300

Plus Dane Housing Limited

7 August 2025

 

Our approach

The Housing Ombudsman’s approach to investigating and determining complaints is to decide what is fair in all the circumstances of the case. This is set out in the Housing Act 1996 and the Housing Ombudsman Scheme (the Scheme). The Ombudsman considers the evidence and looks to see if there has been any ‘maladministration’, for example whether the landlord has failed to keep to the law, followed proper procedure, followed good practice or behaved in a reasonable and competent manner.

Both the resident and the landlord have submitted information to the Ombudsman, and this has been carefully considered. Their accounts of what has happened are summarised below. This report is not an exhaustive description of all the events that have occurred in relation to this case, but an outline of the key issues as a background to the investigation’s findings.

The complaint

  1. The complaint is about the landlord’s handling of the resident’s request for compensation following a kitchen replacement.

Background

  1. The resident holds an assured tenancy. The property is a 2-bedroom house.
  2. The resident made a complaint to the landlord on 13 May 2022. He said he had sold his cooker in preparation for it to replace his kitchen. He was unhappy that the landlord later rearranged the works, which meant it took a further 4 weeks to complete. He asked the landlord to reimburse him for the cost of the family eating takeaways during this time. He said the additional costs meant he could not pay the rent in February 2022.
  3. On 7 June 2022, the landlord provided its stage 1 response to the resident. It:
    1. Apologised for delaying the kitchen replacement by over 2 weeks and for the inconvenience this caused. It explained this was due to resource issues.
    2. Said it had updated him as soon as it could in the new year on 4 January 2022.
    3. Explained that the resident had said he sold the cooker on 4 or 5 January 2022. As such, it said it was not responsible for the choice he made to sell his cooker after he knew of the delay in replacing the kitchen.
    4. Confirmed that it replaced the gas hob on 26 January 2022, 2 days after starting the kitchen replacement. It also had offered a hot plate to use while he was without a cooker, but he had declined this.
    5. Apologised for not logging his complaint sooner. It acknowledged he had asked for compensation and expressed his concerns about the delayed works since February 2022.
    6. Offered £100 compensation. This reflected the delay in logging his complaint and for the inconvenience caused by moving the installation date.
  4. The resident escalated his complaint to the landlord on 3 November 2022. He said he did not accept the offer of compensation. He said he was without cooking facilities for over a month because he had sold his cooker and it had then delayed the works.
  5. On 21 November 2022, the landlord contacted the resident. It explained that it could not accept his request to escalate his complaint. This was because it had been over 5 months since its initial response. It explained that it had credited his rent account with the compensation offered in its earlier response.
  6. The resident escalated his complaint to us. He remained unhappy with the landlord’s offer of compensation. He felt it was not enough to cover the costs incurred by its handling of the kitchen replacement. The complaint became one we could investigate on 5 July 2024.

Assessment and findings

  1. The landlord acknowledged that by rearranging the kitchen installation, it caused the resident inconvenience. On 4 January 2022, it said that it could not start the works as agreed on 6 January 2022. It rearranged the works to start on 24 January 2022, and it completed this on 3 February 2022.
  2. It is evident that the landlord contacted the resident on its first working day after the Christmas and new year period. It was good practice for it to give as much warning as it could about the delay. We acknowledge the timing was unfortunate, as this was 2 working days before the scheduled works. However, this was not a fault on the part of the landlord. It was also appropriate for it to explain why it needed to delay the works, which was due to resourcing issues. This showed openness and transparency in its handling of the matter.
  3. The resident told the landlord that he had sold his cooker in preparation for the works. He said that the delayed works meant he had spent money on takeaways to feed his family. He said this also meant he could not afford to pay his rent in February 2022. The landlord noted that he sold the cooker on either 4 or 5 January 2022, after informing him of the delay in replacing the kitchen. It explained that it was not responsible for his choice to sell the cooker.
  4. While we have no other evidence as to when the resident sold the cooker, he did not dispute the landlord’s comments. The resident has also not provided any evidence to support his comments that he was without a cooker for nearly 2 months. The evidence that is available shows that the replacement works took 8 days to complete. Additionally, the gas hob was replaced within 2 working days of starting the works.
  5. Within the landlord’s response, it said the resident had declined its offer of hot plates during the works. It was good practice for it to offer this to ensure the resident had cooking facilities. It was also appropriate for it to prioritise installing the gas hob in a timely manner for the same reason during the works.
  6. The landlord acknowledged that it had not responded to the resident’s request for compensation in a timely manner. It said that between February 2022 and May 2022, the resident expressed concerns with the kitchen replacement on 5 occasions. It explained that it should have logged his concerns as a complaint much sooner. In doing so, the landlord failed to act in line with our Complaint Handling Code (the Code). However, it was appropriate for it to acknowledge and apologise for its failings. This showed it took accountability for its actions and that it wanted to put things right for the resident.
  7. The landlord’s complaints policy sets out that residents must submit an escalation request within 10 working days of its initial response. The resident escalated his complaint on 3 November 2022, which was around 5 months after its stage 1 response. Therefore the landlord acted in line with its policy by refusing his request to escalate the complaint. The landlord also acted in line with the Code by setting out the reasons for this. It also provided details of his rights to escalate the complaint to us. This was appropriate.
  8. Considering the failures acknowledged by the landlord, its offer of £100 compensation was appropriate to reflect the distress and inconvenience caused to the resident. It appropriately explained the reasons for the delay in the works and its failings in logging his complaint sooner. The landlord’s complaints policy sets out it will pay any compensation to the resident’s rent account if they are in rent arrears. The landlord paid the £100 to the resident’s rent account. It therefore acted in line with its policy in doing so.
  9. We consider that this amount was a fair and reasonable amount in the circumstances. The overall amount was in line with our remedies guidance for failings which did not impact the overall outcome for the resident. Therefore, the apology combined with the offer of compensation amounted to an offer of reasonable redress to the resident.

Determination

  1. In accordance with paragraph 53.b of the Scheme, the landlord made a reasonable offer of redress for its handling of the resident’s request for compensation following a kitchen replacement.